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It is difficult in the face of these provisions to accede to the contention that our Constitution has adopted the American view that the State should have nothing to do with religious institutions and endowments. It would, therefore, not be safe to build any argument based on the "establishment of religion" clause in the first Amendment and the decisions interpreting the same.

7. It is contended by Mr. K. V. Venkatasubramania Aiyar that though there is nothing express in the Constitution corresponding to the "establishment of religion" clause, such a provision must, in view of Article 282 read along with Article 27, be implied therein. Article 282 runs as follows: "The Union or a State may make any grants for any public purpose, notwithstanding that the purpose is not one with respect to which Parliament or the Legislature of the State, as the case may be, may make laws." Though this Article is enabling, in that it empowers the legislature to make grants in respect of matters which are not within their legislative competence, it is restrictive in that grants can be made only for a public purpose. The Article does not in terms prohibit any grant for meeting expenses of administering religious endowments. But it is contended that religion is, under the Constitution, not a public purpose and that, therefore, a grant for purposes mentioned in Section 76 (4) of the Act would be in violation of Article 282.

The argument in support of the position that religion is not a public purpose may be thus summed up; Article 27 prohibits the raising of revenue by taxation for being appropriated towards" the promotion or maintenance of any particular religion or religious denomination.' "That means that religion is not a public purpose and that is in accordance with the American law on the subject. Article 282 is complementary to Article 27. It prohibits the expenditure of public revenue on what are not public purposes. Therefore, public funds cannot under Article 282 be appropriated towards the expenses mentioned in Article 76 (4) of the Act. The result is that the machinery set up under that Act for the administration of the religious endowments cannot function and the whole Act must be declared void.

and the figure in column 9 is Rs. 9,54,700 (vide page 88); the corresponding figure for 1953-54 is Rs. 8,62,000 (vide page 93).
It is clear from these statements that the expenses under Section 76(4) are met out of the general revenues of the State under appropriations made in accordance with the procedure prescribed under Article 202. Incidentally, these statements also show that the administration of religious endowments is carried on by the Government through its department. The question has, therefore, to be decided whether expenditure of public funds under Section 76(4) of the Act is in contravention of Article 282 on the ground that it is not for a public purpose.

As we have disagreed with that contention, it must follow that the law as it stood prior to the Constitution has not undergone a change and it must be held that the provision made in Section 76(4) of the Act for payment of expenses of administration of Religious Endowments by the Government does not violate Article 282 and the Act cannot be held to be void on that ground.

14. The contention was also raised that some of the provisions of the Act went far beyond what was permissible in a legislation relating to the administration of religious endowments and amounted to interference with the free exercise of religion guaranteed by Article 25 and Article 26. It was also argued that the distinction between what is secular and public and what is religious and private may often be difficult to draw and reliance was placed on the following observations in ' (B):